Star Crossed Lovers
by tampoposensei
Summary: Kakashi x Iruka. Sad tale of what happens when true love is denied. KakIru, KakAnko, kakaHini, GaiIru, IruOC, Kakasak yaoi. Happy ending for those who don't like their tragedy tragic. Finished.
1. Chapter 1

A retelling of an old tale. With a KakashiX Iruka twist.

Iruka woke up and stretched an arm towards the man lying beside him. It hit empty space and cold sheets. That was odd. It was Saturday. Kakashi never got up early on Saturdays. He blinked the bleariness from his eyes and stumbled into the kitchen. His lover was seated at the table staring into a cup of tea, mask crumpled beside him, silver hair spilling forward like the seed head of an exotic weed. The tea had been cold for so long that a thin layer of brown scum had formed on its surface, giving it the look of an opaque solid in the bright morning light.

He didn't look up when Iruka sat next to him, but kept staring at his tea as if it held some terrible secret that he wasn't sure he wanted to know. Iruka glanced at the clock on the stove, 6:30. Early. And he'd assumed he must have overslept.

"So what time did you get home last night?" He asked gently.

"Er, sorry wassat?" The copy nin startled as if just realising that the other man was there.

"Kakashi, what time did you get home last night? I gave up on you at midnight and went to bed. Did you go out drinking with your friends after you saw Hokage-sama? You look a bit hung over."

Kakashi shook his head in reply, making his already unruly silver hair spread even wilder. He took a mouthful of cold tea then grimaced in distaste as he swallowed it. "No, I went for a walk, needed to think. I didn't go to bed."

Iruka gasped and shot out a hand to feel the other man's jacket. "But it rained last night! Yes, you're still damp. You mean you've been sitting there all night in wet clothes?" He stood up and pulled the slightly dazed older man to his feet. "Come on, I'm putting you in a warm shower before you get sick."

Kakashi made eye contact, making Iruka realise for the first time that he'd been avoiding it before. Then allowed himself to be hustled into the bathroom and stripped, while the gushing water ran through the system until it was hot. Iruka couldn't resist letting his eyes sweep over his lover's naked body. Kakashi caught the look. And felt the heat he'd kindled in the other's chakra. It brought a welcome glow to at least one small part of him

"Want to join me?"

The easy smirk on his face was in sharp contrast to the guttural rasp in his voice. Then without warning he pulled Iruka into the shower still wearing the teeshirt and boxers that he had slept in.

"Kakashi!" The teacher objected, laughing, as he pulled off his soaked clothes and tossed them to the corner of the shower.

"Well you said you wanted to warm me up." The copy nin answered as he pressed his body into the younger man's, hooking his chin over his shoulder.

He was as cold as marble.

"God you're like ice!" Iruka gasped, turning them both around so that the other's back faced the full force of the shower. He scrubbed him energetically with soap, trying to bring some circulation back to his pale skin.

Kakashi stretched out, freeing himself, then pushed the darker man to the back of the shower. Trapping him there with an arm on either side. "I am, I'm cold all the way through. Will you warm me? You're the only one who can."

The shower water was hitting Iruka full in the face now, blinding him. He blinked, trying to make out the expression in Kakashi's mismatched eyes. "You mean right now?"

"I've never wanted you more Iruka. And you know that I've wanted you a lot."

In response the teacher leaned past him and turned off the water. He glanced back into those eyes, expecting to see a smile, but there was none. So he reached out to grab two towels and draped one over his shoulders and one over the other man's. Then led the way into their bedroom.

They kissed fiercely, hungrily, for a few minutes. Iruka was acutely aware of the other's desperate need. And something else too, a tiny unstable flare in his chakra that he had never felt before, and had never expected to. Then Kakashi rolled him onto his stomach and whispered in his ear. "May I?'

Iruka blushed, but blood was gathering in more than his cheeks. "Yes I'd like that." He admitted.

Iruka felt cool.slickness being applied between his buttocks. Then held his breath, in pleasurable anticipation of what was to come, as his lover's skillful fingers prepared him. He felt a spike of heat that quickly spread into warmth in his clenched belly, and hot desire beneath it. A gasp of delight escaped from deep down inside. It felt so good to have their two bodies joined like this, so right. Kakashi's hand snaked around his hips and grasped him, squeezing gently, maintaining his rhythm. It was good, after five years together Iruka knew it would be. Very good.

And then it wasn't. Pleasant heat became burning pain.

"Stop kakashi! Please you're hurting me!" He choked, shocked that his most gentle of lovers had lost his touch so suddenly and completely.

But kakashi didn't stop. He was panting hard and fast in his ear, like a machine, blind and deaf. The pain became excruciating, like hot metal being poured into him. Iruka screamed and bucked his body. Pushing the other man off him as he rolled over. He lay on his side, knees pulled up to his chest, sobbing.

Kakashi lay stunned for a moment then reached over to touch his partner. Who pulled away reflexively. "Oh God, what happened, what did I do?" He asked, his voice breaking.

Iruka couldn't answer. He was shaking like a leaf and desperately trying to get control over his breathing. But he let Kakashi pull him against his own body and cradle him with one arm, while he ran the fingers of his other hand through wet dark hair. Gradually the pain eased and he was able to relax a little.

"You hurt me." He said unnecessarily. Kakashi sat up and turned his back to him, swinging his feet off the bed.

Iruka could see the knotted muscles in his slumped shoulders. He sat up and started to massage them gently. "Kakashi, what's wrong? Why are you being moody like this? You're _never_ moody. You're always so completely self possessed. Self possessed and self controlled, it's the only mood you have."

He paused, blinking back the hot tears that were threatening to return to his eyes. "Did I do something wrong? Are you angry with me?"

Kakashi rounded on him, almost shouting. "God no! I'm not angry with you, I'm angry but not with you, never with you!"

The copy nin grabbed him and clutched him tight against his chest as if the teacher might slip away, then spoke very quietly. Perhaps if no one could hear, then the words wouldn't exist, wouldn't mean anything. "I have to leave you Iruka. Give you up. I've been ordered to get married, to a woman."

Iruka heard. His eyes went wide with shock. "You mean that's what Hokage-sama… ? But… but she can't do that!"

"She can. She can order me to do anything she likes. I'm nearly thirty, I won't be able to fight the way I do forever. And I'm the last of my line, she wants me to have children, Hatake genius children to take my place." He cast his eyes down and noticed the sheet where Iruka had been lying. "Oh my God you're bleeding! I have to get you to the hospital!"

The teacher squawked and pulled a cover around himself. "No! It's not so bad now, I… I'll be fine. I won't let people think you raped me then dumped me. I still care about your reputation even if you don't." Kakashi was already dressed. He looked anxiously at the other man and decided that he didn't have the time or the energy to argue with him.

"Then lie still and rest. I'll get some medicine, salve and antibiotics. But if it still hurts tomorrow I'm taking you in. You can't stop me so get used to the idea."

Then he was gone, leaving Iruka hurt and bleeding. In his soul much more deeply and painfully than in his body.

Oooooooo

When Kakashi got back Iruka was dressed and in the kitchen.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" He yelled, snatching him off his feet and carrying him back to the bedroom. "I told you to lie still!"

"And I told you I'm fine, stop treating me like a damned incompetent half-wit!" Iruka protested, struggling uselessly against the other's grip as he was laid carefully on the bed.

Kakashi kept hold of his wrists, but softly now, then leaned over and kissed him tenderly. "Look, I know you're upset. We're both upset, but fighting with each other will only make it worse."

Iruka relented. "You're right. You're always right. Well... nearly always." He just managed a thin smile.

"Of course I'm right." Kakashi grinned back. "I'm a genius, didn't you know? Now roll over so that I can treat you with this stuff."

He raised his headband and examined the younger man with his sharigan eye, while Iruka slipped the sweatpants he was wearing down past his knees and turned onto his stomach. The bleeding had stopped and he wasn't torn internally, just badly bruised. Kakashi sighed with relief and then started to apply the salve, smearing it and pushing it inside with his long slender fingers. It was soothing and numbed the pain quickly. Soon Iruka found himself responding to the familiar probing. He spread his legs a little wider, allowing Kakashi to go deeper.

Even without the sharigan uncovered the copy nin would have noticed. He slipped a hand under the other man. "Umino Iruka you horny bastard, you're getting hard!"

He got a fiery blush in reply. "Please Kakashi, we didn't get to finish before."

The copy nin slapped his lover's bare buttock playfully. "Ha! Well forget it. You aren't getting any more of that for at least a week, probably two. If we have that long."

"But couldn't we do something else…" Then Kakashi's words cut through the fog of lust clouding his brain. "What do you mean? If we have that long. When is this marriage supposed to happen."

Kakashi looked away, as if the spider spinning its web in the corner of the ceiling was suddenly the most fascinating thing he had ever seen. "Tsunade is already planning the wedding. It's just a case of filling in the blank for the bride's name."

All thought of sex was gone, all thought of anything, except… two weeks! Kakashi was leaving him with only two weeks notice! Iruka wouldn't give up so easily. "But… but it doesn't have to be so bad. You'll just have to explain to her, your wife. About us I mean, that she'll have to share."

Iruka found himself staring hard into the other's eyes, both eyes. The sharigan whorled into action in fits and starts, responding to Kakashi's agitation. "No Iruka." He said solemnly. "I was up all night thinking this through. I want you to be my partner, not my whore. I love you too much to let you settle for anything less."

The bottom fell out of Iruka's world. He remained fixed in the sharigan's hypnotic glare. Unable to speak, unable to throw himself on the floor and scream as he wanted too. Watching silent tears stream from Obito's eye, just as they were streaming from his own.

Kakashi swallowed hard and continued. "I want you to move on. Find someone else, someone who's allowed to love you the way you deserve to be loved. There are dozens who would jump at the chance." He pulled Iruka towards him, pressing their wet faces together, then whispered. "This doesn't have to ruin both our lives."

Now Iruka understood how Kakashi had lost control enough to hurt him before. He just wanted to fuck until they were both senseless. Because nothing else made any sense anymore, it never would again. He started to strip his silver haired lover for the second time that morning.

"Please Kakashi, I need you."

"I know Iruka, I need you too."

Oooooooooooooooooooooo


	2. Chapter 2

The two men were looking at pictures. Dozens of pictures. Of women. Photographs of every strong eligible konoichi of childbearing age in Konoha.

"So these are the women Hakage-sama wants you to choose from?" Iruka said with a sigh.

"Yeah."

"How are you going to pick?"

Kakashi leaned back in his seat at the kitchen table and put his hands over his face wearily. Covering his visible eye. "I don't care. Anyone. Well anyone who can put up with me and who won't drive me too much crazier than I already am."

"And whoever you choose will just have to marry you?"

"Yeah, I suppose so."

Iruka saw a glimmer of hope. "But I know a lot of these women. They wouldn't want to get married any more than you do." He blushed at the indecency of what he was about to suggest. "Maybe one or two of them would be willing to have your children without getting married."

Kakashi shot a surprised look at him, grinning widely. "Iruka-sensei!" Then he looked grim again. "I already suggested that. Tsunade thinks that children should grow up in a traditional household with two parents. And that it takes a genius to raise a genius, or at least a sane one."

"But you didn't. You raised yourself without any parents from an even younger age than I did."

"Yeah, but I said a sane one. I think that's pretty much her point."

Iruka reached over and took his hand, squeezing it gently. "Kakashi you aren't crazy. You think a little differently to other people but that's just part of being a genius. You're probably the most level headed person I know."

"Maybe, while I have you. Without you I'm not sure… " He put his other hand over the teacher's, squeezing it in turn. "Hey, you said you know a lot of these women, are there any you would recommend? I mean that you think I could get along with? You know me better than anyone."

The suggestion made Iruka shift uncomfortably in his seat. "You want me to find my own replacement?"

"Kakashi's eye softened. "Iruka no one can replace you. Just find someone who won't hate me too much, and who isn't jealous. I _would_ like us to be able to stay friends."

That was something he hadn't considered. "Ok, I'll be your matchmaker. But I can't promise that I'll be any good at it."

"Good and I'll be yours." The copy nin grinned sheepishly. "Well you can't expect me to let you stay single for a year and a half while someone else stalks you the way I had to. That would be far too much temptation to bear."

Iruka blushed, "So when do we start?"

Kakashi considered carefully. "Wednesday. Then a new date every weeknight for as long as it takes. That will leave us the weekend to be together."

Wednesday night rolled around, much too soon. They were both in their bedroom, neatly groomed, cologned and dressed in fashionable jeans. Iruka was wearing a blue silk shirt and Kakashi a black linen one. Shirts that they had recently bought as gifts for each other.

Kakashi looked over his partner approvingly. He wondered if they had time for a quickie before meeting their dates, but regretfully decided against. Iruka looked stressed enough as it was without adding further complications. "So who do you have for me?" He asked with feigned enthusiasm and genuine curiosity.

The younger man gave him a nervous look. "Well you probably aren't going to like it, but you see she found out what I was doing and insisted that I put her first. You only have to go on the one date, unless you find that you like her I mean, in which case…"

"Who is it Iruka?"

"Anko."

"ANKO! You set me up for a date with Anko!"

"She'd have eaten me alive if I'd turned her down." Iruka's voice had become very quiet.

Kakashi glared with his one eye, Iruka almost expected him to uncover the other. "So you decided to let her eat me alive instead!"

"You can handle her Kakashi, I know you can." To change the subject, although he really didn't want to know, Iruka asked. "So who did you find for me?"

Iruka should have been warned by the way Kakashi's expression became unusually smug. Even for him.

"Gai."

"GAI! MAITO GAI! How could you Kakashi? Is he even gay?"

"He will be if that's what it takes to surpass me. I challenged him to make you love him more than you love me."

"You made _me_ a challenge! With Gai?"

Kakashi was pouting. "I thought it was unusually clever, genius even." Suddenly he became very earnest, clutching the younger man's shoulder then pulling him into a hug. "He's a nice guy Iruka, and a really good man. And he's strong, he'll protect you and take care of you properly." Then pushing him back to arm's length, he looked at him with a strange mixture of lechery and pained regret. "His stamina is legendary."

"But Kakashi, Gai?"

ooooo

Anko's apartment was dark inside. Over furnished with bulky carved furniture and shrouded by heavy drapes. Kakashi remembered when he had lived like that. Behind dusty drapes that were never opened, day or night. Then Iruka had come into his life and let in the sunlight.

Stop! That's in the past, you have to let go, to move forward into the future.

He sensed rather than saw Anko move next to him. She ran the palm of one hand slowly up the length of his back.

"Well you're not as late as I expected you to be." Kakashi-san. The room went from too dark to too bright as she flicked on the light. "So what are you waiting for? Let me see what's under there."

Kakashi blinked in surprise. "You want me to take off my mask?"

She threw back her head. "Ha! No. I don't care about your face, it's the rest that I want to see." She slipped off her dress letting it pool around her ankles, then slid down her panties and stepped out of them.

She stood for a moment, letting her perfect naked body have full impact, before advancing on him and slowly unbuttoning his shirt.

He grabbed her hand, halting her. The pervert within was screaming at him, telling him to go for it. Now! On the cold tile floor. "You want to have sex on the first date?"

Anko traced around his fingers on her arm with her other hand then stepped forward and pressed against him, hissing in his ear. "How long is it since you were with a woman Hatake? Do you still remember how? Disappoint me and I promise you won't even get a first date, much less a second."

He slipped down his mask and pressed his mouth against hers, but instead of kissing he bit her lower lip, hard. Making it bleed. "I'm sorry Anko-san, but I don't think the two of us could have the kind of relationship that Hokage-sama has in mind… for raising children."

He slipped his mask back in place to cover his grin and buttoned his shirt as he let himself out. Then went home to wait impatiently for Iruka.

Oooooooooooo

Gai must have been waiting to see Kakashi leave, because the moment he was gone Iruka heard him tap loudly at the door. He opened it and Konoha's green beast bowed formally, then took his hand and kissed it.

Gai looked Iruka over approvingly. He'd never been on a date with another man before, but this wasn't just another man. This was Umino Iruka, the man who had won his rival's heart, and a force not to be taken lightly. He noticed the way Iruka's blue shirt brought out the shine in his eyes. The way the scar on his face arched across the bridge of his nose, almost begging for a smile in the interest of symmetry. But most of all he couldn't keep his eyes off the teacher's hair. Not as dark or as shiny as his own, but so silky and so bouncy. He wanted to untie it from its binding and let it spill loose, to run his fingers through it, to smell the man's scent collected in it. Something to work hard for.

Still holding Iruka's hand he led him to the horse-drawn carriage that he had hired to take them to the restaurant.

Iruka did have a wonderful evening with Gai. The restaurant was the best in Konoha, although not quite the most expensive. Iruka had suggested to Kakashi that they should go there together on several special occasions, but they never had. Although Kakashi praised Iruka's cooking, the teacher knew that food was really just fuel to the copy nin, like oxygen. And although some was better quality, he really didn't feel it made much sense to go out of the way to find it.

But Iruka did like good food, he loved good food. And he was thoroughly enjoying having someone to enjoy it with, someone who loved it as much as he did. Except when he glanced up and saw Gai's stern face and thick eyebrows. Just don't look at the eyebrows you moron, don't even think about them.

Kakashi's eyebrows intruded on his thoughts, arched and white. He smiled fondly.

"Good I'd like that too, very much." He heard Gai say and had a moment of panic over what he'd silently agreed to, until he realised that the other man was preparing to walk him home.

Gai bought Iruka a rose and then they walked along the river for a while, stopping on the bridge to look at the stars. Gai knew the names of all the constellations, of course Iruka did too, he taught them. But Gai knew other things, he knew that the constellation called the Dragon in Japan was called the Hydra in Europe and the Serpent by the natives of North America. He marveled eloquently that such different cultures had seen exactly the same shape in a random scattering of stars. And Iruka marveled at him, as they strolled back to his house through the night. He really was a nice guy. At least in the dark you couldn't see those eyebrows.

Iruka was about to turn and unlock his door when Gai stepped very close to him, towering over him. The man's sheer bulk, at such a small distance, made the teacher hesitate. Gai must have thought he was waiting because an instant later he had one hand behind Iruka's back, leaning him off balance, and another fisted in his ponytail. Iruka wasn't really aware that he'd opened his mouth at all, and if he had it was in surprise, not invitation. But Konoha's green beast claimed it anyway, breathing into it hot and fast. Feeling every inch of it with his tongue. Tasting, and glorying in the taste of, this man. Who in just a few hours had turned on its head all of his ideas about what it meant to be manly.

Reluctantly he pulled away, watching sadly as each of the silver strands of saliva connecting them broke, and took a final long look at Iruka's lovely face. Then he bowed again and turned away. If he won this challenge it might be the last one he'd ever need.

Iruka stumbled into the house.

"Looked like a good kiss." He heard Kakashi say from the darkness.

"Oh you're home. How long have you been here?"

"About four hours."

"Then it didn't go too well with Anko."

"She's a predator. I ditched her and came home to you." Iruka could hear the sulk in the other man's voice.

"Kakashi, if you're going to be jealous I can't do this. You were the one who challenged him."

For the second time that evening Iruka was surprised by a kiss, but this time he welcomed it, gave as good as he got. He was dimly aware of an arched white eyebrow, above a glowing red eye, as he was steered into the bedroom and into bed.

Oooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Iruka had been late going to bed and considerably later going to sleep. So when his alarm rang at 5:30 the next morning he was not well rested. He cast an envious glance at the silver haired man next to him, then kissed him just to show that there were no hard feelings.

Because he was already late he just kicked the bouquet of flowers that he tripped over on the doorstep, inside the house, and ran.

When he got home from the academy, later than he would have liked, they had been neatly arranged in a vase and were in the middle of the kitchen table. Kakashi was almost hidden behind them.

"Nice roses, who are they from?" Iruka asked.

Kakashi nodded to a card propped next to them. Iruka picked it up and read: To My Sweet Iruka, The other eleven roses. Your Nice Gai.

"I don't give you flowers do I?" Kakashi asked sadly. "I wish I had, It's too late now of course. Do you think he'd win, if it were a real competition? Would you choose Gai over me?"

Iruka smiled mischieviously. "Well he is a really nice guy, and he's generous, and thoughtful, and smart, and strong."

"But?" The copy nin asked hopefully.

"But he's just too big, and too hairy, and those eyebrows… urgh!"

Kakashi laughed. "I'm sure he'll shave them off if you ask."

Iruka cringed. "I don't know, Gai without eyebrows? Somehow that's even worse. I'm sorry to be so horribly shallow, but will you tell him? That it just isn't going to happen between us I mean. I don't want to lead him on."

"I'll try, but I doubt if he'll stop. Even if I do tell him that it's not a real challenge. But if you prefer smooth and beautiful I have a treat for you tonight."

"Who?" Iruka couldn't think of anyone.

"Ah, you'll find out soon. Who do you have for me? Someone a little more gentle I hope."

"Er, you could say that, it's Hyuga Hinita." Iruka waited for the bomb to drop.

"What? Hinata! I can't take her out, she won't say a word all evening. I'll die of boredom."

"Actually you won't be taking her out. It was Hiashi who approached me. He's interested in blending Hatake genius with the Hyuga bloodline, he wants you to go to a formal reception at the main house."

"IRUKA! I can't go to a formal reception! My father used to go to those things, you have to wear seventeen layers of sleeves or something."

"Seven." Iruka corrected.

"Seven , seventeen, whatever. I can't wear seventeen layers of sleeves, I only have one layer of arms. And they're Hyuga's, they'll know if I've got it all wrong, they'll be able to see."

"Kakashi, Hiashi knows you well enough to understand that you're well… sort of casual. Just wear something nice, he won't be shocked if you aren't all done up in formal wear. Anyway, even if he is, do you really want to be his son-in law?"

Kakashi grinned. "Since when did you get to be so cool Iruka?"

"Since you got to be so flustered. You should get ready those things start early."

As it turned out Iruka was right. Hyuga Hiashi wasn't shocked when the Copy nin sauntered up to the Hyuga main house wearing Italian silk pants and a silk shirt. But he obviously wasn't happy either. He greeted him with warm words and an icy demeanour. Kashi spent the next several hours seated on the floor with all the Hyuga menfolk, enduring endless tiny portions of food, endless polite formal conversation and endless pitying looks from Neji.

The evening only started to look up when he decided that the others had consumed sufficient sake to not notice when he slipped away to a quiet corner. He had intended to read his book, but it seemed that Iruka had taken it out of his pocket before he left home. Hinita, who had served him his food and sake, but who hadn't spoken a word other than a single formal greeting, came and joined him. At first she asked after Naruto. Kakashi told her what he knew about his former student's current adventures. He was touched that the Hyuga heir still obviously cared about the boy. She then moved on to village politics and a variety of other subjects, about which she was clearly well informed and had thought a great deal.

Kakashi wondered what she thought about their present situation. "What do you think of your father's plan? Are you interested in having me as a husband?"

"Kakashi-sensei, any woman would be honoured to have you as their husband. However I know I'm small and weak but there are many things I hope to do before I become a wife and mother, many changes I'd like to make." She looked in Neji's direction and lowered her eyelids, whether she also lowered her eyes was hard to tell.

He left the compound very very late, with a much higher opinion of the girl but a much lower one of her family.

Iruka arrived at the tearoom, where Kakashi had arranged for him to meet his date, fifteen minutes early. He wanted a chance to see who it was before _he _was seen. As luck would have it he ran into a former student, Tomonori Yuki. A quiet shy boy, pretty in a slightly feminine way, with very long black hair and tan skin. He had become a genin a year before Naruto and his class.

"Yuki-san!" He called out, waving to him then bowing. "I'm just waiting to meet someone, won't you join me?"

The young man's face lit up. "Iruka-sensei, I'm waiting to meet someone too. Let me get you some tea."

Iruka strained to remember some details about the quiet boy. "Thank you Yuki-san, I believe we're equal in rank now."

Yuki smiled widely, showing perfect white teeth. "Yes, I made chuunin three years ago, at my second attempt."

"Congratulations, you'll surpass me soon."

The boy looked very serious, his eyes widening to great dark orbs. "Oh no Sensei-san, you're the best, no one will ever surpass you."

Iruka laughed easily. "Really you shouldn't be so naïve at your age. Teachers are just people, we have all the same weaknesses and flaws as everyone else."

Yuki frowned for a moment, as if something Iruka had said bothered him. Then he smiled again. "So who are you waiting for Iruka-sensei?"

The teacher blushed. "Well, my date. It's sort of complicated but Kakashi-san will be getting married soon and he wanted to find someone to keep me company."

The young man was still smiling. "That seems unusually broadminded of you both. What does he look like, I assume it is a he?"

Iruka's blush deepened. "Er yes he is, and as I said it's complicated. Kakashi described him as beautiful, tall and lean with long hair and smooth dark skin. I'm surprised I haven't seen him, he really should be here by now."

Yuki's expression changed, becoming deep and intense. Iruka felt a strange instability in the youth's chakra as he leaned across the table and put his hand over the one the teacher was holding his teacup in. "See, Yuki is such a silly name for me. I'm even darker than you are."

Iruka's eyes shot up to meet the nearly black ones boring into him, as the truth dawned. "You mean…?"

"Yes Iruka-chan, I'm your date."

The teacher put the teacup down and tried to pull his hand away but it was held in a surprisingly strong grip. "Now now, Hatake-san warned me that you would be timid and try to run. But I'm not going to let you. Now that I have you I'm going to keep you."

"What… what else did Kakashi say?"

"Only that if I hurt you in any way he'd kill me. Come on, let's go somewhere more private. Somewhere we can talk."

Iruka was in a daze as he let the young man, who was still holding him in an iron grip, lead him out onto the street. "Where are we going?"

"To my apartment, unless you'd rather go to yours. But Hatake-san said that he didn't know when he'd be back, and we wouldn't want to be disturbed."

Iruka was already quite sufficiently disturbed. He knew that Kakashi probably wouldn't get home until the early hours, so that didn't help. "Er, maybe we could just walk for a while, it's a very pleasant evening."

Yuki was still holding Iruka's left hand in his. He stretched his right arm over the teacher's shoulders."

"Yuki-san, don't you feel that's uncomfortably close?"

The youth laughed. "You are shy aren't you?" He touched the back of his hand against Iruka's burning cheek. "I'm sorry, I can't wait for you like Hatake-san did. I've waited far too long already. Don't you think it was uncomfortable for me, keeping my legs crossed for a whole year, trying to hide the hard on you gave me just by being in the same classroom. I've been in love with you since I was six and I first saw you at the academy. My oldest brother was in your class. When you became a chuunin teacher I prayed every day that you would teach my class. Then when you did it was heaven and hell wrapped up together. Seeing you and wanting you but being nothing more than another kid in your class."

"I'm sorry Yuki-san but I can't think of you as anything but a former student. I know you're not twelve years old anymore but you are still very young."

An instant later Yuki had him pressed against the wall of a building, dotting his face with tiny kisses. "I'm not the shy little boy you remember Iruka-chan. I'm taller than you and stronger than you. I'm nineteen, all grown up now."

To make his point he ground his hips against him. Pushing his erection against the tight muscles of the teacher's stomach. Iruka knew that he should be enjoying this. Wasn't finding someone like Yuki exactly what he needed to do?

But it wasn't Kakashi and he didn't want anyone but Kakashi touching him. He smiled then planted a single chaste kiss on the boy's lips. "I'm going to go home now Yuki-san. It's very common for students to get crushes on teachers, but I'm sure you'll soon find someone who'll suit you much better than I ever could."

He wriggled free then went home to wait for Kakashi.


	3. Chapter 3

Split part III into 2 parts so I can get this posted. Like to finish what I start. Now this is a tragedy folks, it's supposed to be tragic. However... I do have some ideas for a copout loophole alternate ending that could still work. So if you really really can't stand it let me know. But let me finish the story the way I see it first, ok?

Thanks for the reviews, I do appreciate them and take them to heart (see above) but my own vision counts too. Sorry I can't acknowledge by name, I can't get to that page from here without bolluxing it all up. I'll do it later. If you know a better way to respond to reviews let me know. Anyway..

The story continues here:-

Kakashi had been a tiger when he came home that night, a gentle powerful purring snow tiger. All hard muscle, like a tightly wound spring, and soft white hair that got every where. Just as Kakashi got everywhere, on every part of Iruka anyway. He'd tried to stealth into bed, assuming that Iruka would already be asleep. But the younger man wasn't asleep, couldn't sleep without the other beside him. He wondered, when this was over, if he'd ever sleep again.

When Iruka had finally slipped into unconsciousness in his arms, exhausted, Kakashi got up to make breakfast. So as his alarm rang ninety minutes later, the teacher woke to the smell of fresh coffee and burnt toast. He dragged himself out of bed and into the kitchen where the copy nin was standing on a chair putting the smoke detector back together. He sat at the table and took a long swallow of the life restoring caffeine that appeared in his hands.

"Feeling better?" Kakashi asked, sitting opposite him.

"Urgh, too soon to tell." Iruka's eyes slowly focussed enough to make out a small bouquet of violets on the table, next to the roses.

"Yuki didn't send those did he?" He asked in alarm.

Kakashi shook his head and handed him a card. To my sweet Iruka, these shy blossoms reminded me so much of you. Gai.

"I told you he wouldn't give up so easily. By the way how was your date? I told you that he's beautiful."

Iruka sighed. "Yes he is, and strong and passionate. A bit like you." He added, suddenly realising that that was the point. "How was Hinata?"

"Very sweet and very intelligent. I'll marry her if she can divorce her whole horrible clan first."

He smiled brightly, obviously trying to change the mood. "But I have someone quite different for you tonight."

Iruka felt that he just couldn't take any more. "Please Kakashi no more dates. I've been on my own since I was twelve, except these five years I've had with you. And they're my greatest treasure, I'll hold them in my heart forever, and if it's all I get then it will be more than enough. Most people don't get half that much. But I can be on my own again. Just don't try to force me to be something I'm not."

Kakashi scooted around to the chair next to him. "Alright, if that's what you really want."

He nestled his face against the soft brown skin at the nape of Iruka's neck and gently mouthed along the length of his collarbone. When he reached the front he ran his tongue over the notch at the base of his throat, before looking up into eyes that were now glazed with desire, as well as fatigue.

"But I don't have that choice. Tsunade told me yesterday that if I don't choose someone soon she'll marry me herself."

Iruka went rigid. "But she can't do that! Surely she's too old!"

The copy nin allowed his head to droop, tickling him with his hair. "Would you take that chance?"

Darkness and dread started to close in on Iruka's mind. Then, like the sky after a storm, everything became clear.

"We have to leave." He said slowly.

Kakashi's head shot up to fix him with an eye as cold and hard as steel. "You mean run, go missing?"

Iruka nodded. "It's not our fault that they've forced us into this position. You can get us out, hide us, they'll never track _you_ down. We can go up into the mountains and be farmers or monks…"

"Monks?"

The corners of the teacher's mouth twitched into a smile. "Well we can dress like monks."

Kakashi glanced at the clock on the stove. "You have to leave right now or you might be late. We mustn't do anything that's even the slightest bit unusual. No one will expect to see much of us this weekend, they all know it's our last one as a couple. With any luck we won't be missed until you don't show up at the academy on Monday morning."

Iruka swallowed the rest of his cold coffee and ran to get dressed.

Oooooooo

At the end of classes Iruka sat in his classroom grading quizzes. He was desperate, way beyond desperate, to get home. But he remembered Kakashi's warning about not doing anything unusual. And, although he would often take essays and tests home to grade, he always finished grading quizzes before he left.

He was almost through the stack when he sensed a familiar, but unexpected, presence enter the room. "Sakura-chan?" He said, trying very very hard not to sound irritated.

"Can I speak to you for a few minutes?"

"Of course Sakura-chan." Iruka was trying so hard to suppress his nervous chakra that he didn't notice the girl's flaring out of control too much for her to be able to tell.

"It's about Kakashi-sensei."

Iruka lost the struggle and his anxiety spread all over the room. "What's wrong? Is he hurt?"

She smiled. "No, I'm not here as a medic. Actually I wanted to ask you to get me a date with him."

The teacher was too stunned to speak.

"You see," she continued, "I've really liked him, loved him I suppose, for a long time now. I know how you're helping him and I was afraid that you wouldn't think of me. You know because I was his student, and I'm only eighteen and, well lots of reasons." She looked up at Iruka shyly. "All I want is a chance in with everyone else and I really would try to make him happy."

"Sakura, I had no idea!"

"I've never told anyone before." She shot a look at the teacher. "There really wasn't any point and I didn't want to look like even more of an idiot, especially after Sasuke."

"Yes I see, after Sasuke. Do you think Naruto will find him this time?"

"Actually I sort of hope he doesn't. I'm afraid of what he might have turned into by now."

"Maybe, but he has a lot of hidden character, he's a lot like Kakashi in many ways."

Sakura smiled. "Yes but Kakashi-sensei hides it better. It took me a couple of years to work out that his laziness and lateness and porn reading is all fake. And that underneath he really is really special."

Iruka blushed pink. "I can't disagree with you, although I'm afraid he actually does like the porn."

Sakura's eyes widened. "Oh! Well I suppose if you've put up with it this long I could too. By the way, you will explain to Naruto right? When he gets back? He'd kill me if he thought I was trying to take Kakashi-sensei away from you."

Despite the precariousness of his current situation and the recklessness of what he was about to do, Iruka found himself grinning happily that he had found at least one other person who considered his lover lovable.

At home he found Kakashi waiting. He had expected to copy nin to affect an air of perfect calm, so he was surprised and impressed to find that he had exactly the same low level of sad resignation that he'd had all week.

He gave Iruka a lecherous look. "I need to shower for my date tonight, care to join me?" Once in the shower stall he made no attempt to pull the teacher in with him. Instead he whispered instructions under the cover of the gushing water.

"We're leaving for the Snow country as soon as I get back."

"But you hate being cold."

"I know. Pack as much light clothing as you can but just one warm coat. Lots of thin layers are as warm as a few thick ones, we don't want to tip them off. Bring some good weapons and some armour, we won't have any back up. We have enough food for three days without buying more, bring it all. After that we'll hunt."

So it was real, they would be hunted outcasts for the rest of their lives but at least they would live or die together.

Kakashi left for the bar where he was to meet his date, relieved that Iruka had chosen somewhere loud, where he wouldn't have to maintain a conversation.

Iruka set about following Kakashi's instructions then lay down on the bed. He had had less than seven hours sleep in the past two days and he would need all his edge.

He woke to see blue and red eyes staring into his.

"I'm sorry."

Kakashi's words didn't make any sense to his sleep clogged brain.

"I'm sorry Iruka, I can't do it."

There was too much pain in those eyes. Iruka wrapped his arms around him. It was so unlike Kakashi to be the needy one.

"What can't you do Kakashi?"

"I can't go missing. Run. I want to, I really do. You're right, we can find a safe place and stay there quietly for the rest of our lives. But I'm not like you I've _never _disobeyed, ever. I've been a ninja since I was five, followed orders since I was three. I just can't go against all that now."

Iruka kissed him hard, holding the back of his head so that he could push his tongue and his lips so far into the other man that no one would know where one ended and the other began.

"Don't you dare apologise for being a better and more loyal shinobi than I am. I never should have suggested this in the first place. I asked you not to try to force me to be something I'm not then turned around and tried to make you go against everything you've been your whole life."

"Then you understand?"

"Of course I do, I understand you better than anyone, you said so yourself."

"I'll just marry one of them, Anko, Tsunade, that woman tonight. I don't care."

"Sakura." Iruka cut in. "She came to see me today to ask for a date with you. She said she's had a secret thing for you for years."

"Sakura? Why didn't she ever say anything?"

"Well you weren't available until now."

"Alright, I'll marry Sakura."

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo


	4. Chapter 4

Iruka wasn't sure whether Kakashi and Sakura's wedding was slightly more, or slightly less, wretched than his parents funeral. After a while the two started to blur in his mind. People wearing white, priests, incense, ceremony, tears, flowers. He drank a lot of champagne, which left him more confused but no less unhappy.

As soon as he could he slipped away and went home. To the little house that was now just his house, since the village had provided the famous copy nin and his new bride with a home closer to the center of town. He picked up Gai's latest floral offering on the way in, and looked in vain for an unoccupied vessel that would hold water, to put it in. Finding none he dropped the cut ends of the stems in the goldfish bowl and went to lie down on the bed, which was now just his bed.

Kakashi really tried to bring a spark of something, anything to his wedding night. He had read almost all the way through two whole Icha Icha volumes in preparation. And no one had chakra control like his. But his heart, quite frankly, was not in it. The sex was exuberant, inspired even, effective and completely passionless. Sakura told herself that it was enough for him to satisfy her with mind-blowing orgasms even if they did seem hollow and cold beyond the pyrotechnics. She knew that Kakashi was fond of her and that gave her something to build on, more might come in time.

The next night was very much the same and so was the next. By the third week his casual cheerfulness was starting to show just a little strain. Sakura decided to spare them both the charade, she said she was tired and went to bed early. She started going to bed early a lot. When Kakashi was sent on a solo three-week mission, just after their first month of marriage, it was a relief to both of them.

It was a hard mission. The kind with poison vines that tangled around his limbs and burned off his skin where they touched. Stealthed shinobi that materialised out of the mists attacking him with every kind of sharp or explosive weapon he'd ever heard of. And huge rocks falling on his head every time he went anywhere near a damn hillside and sometimes even when he didn't. And to cap it all, his feet were cold and wet the whole time. He was miserable, but he was even more miserable at the thought of going home.

When Kakashi staggered back through the gate he was cut, he was tired and he was definitely feeling some kind of mind-altering effect from the poison on those vines. So it wasn't altogether strange that he found himself climbing in through Iruka's bedroom window, the one he had always returned to after a mission, and not his own.

"Kakashi what are you doing here?" Iruka gasped, woken from his shallow sleep by the familiar chakra.

"Oh sorry, wrong house. I just got back." The copy nin said distractedly.

Iruka immediately picked up on the slur in his speech. "Well you're in terrible shape, rest and let me clean you up a bit before you go home."

Although he was married to the best medical nin in the village, the thought of Iruka's gentle fingers tending his wounds was more than Kakashi could resist. The teacher waited outside the bathroom while he took a shower and turned his back when he came out wrapped in nothing but a towel.

"You're going to have to look at me if you're going to fix these holes." Kakashi said as lightly as he could, stretching out on the bed. The bed that smelled so strongly of Iruka that he was forced to redirect much needed energy to stop his thoughts from showing.

"Yes." Iruka said glancing up shyly from the bandages and salves that he was fussing with.

He peeled back the towel and turned his attention to the largest wound. A six inch gash from a kunai across his abdomen that Kakashi had decided, in the heat of battle, was preferable to a slice with a katana across his neck. The wound wasn't serious, barely more than skin deep, but it was bleeding steadily. Iruka applied an antibiotic and closed it with strips. Then, before he taped gauze over it, he couldn't resist his old superstitious habit and leaned in to kiss it better. Kakashi felt hot lips trembling against his skin. He grabbed the younger man's hand and pulled him towards him, forcing him to make eye contact.

"Iruka when did you last have sex?"

The teacher looked away, staring at the other man's white fingers and red blood on his hand. "You know when Kakashi."

"You mean the night before my wedding? But that was more than two months ago!"

Iruka wanted to cry, he clamped down on his feelings, locking them up tightly. He'd got good at that lately. "I've gone longer."

Kakashi was shocked to see how his sweet over emotional lover had become so repressed and joyless. "Well you shouldn't. I'll tell the lovely Yuki to pay you a visit."

Iruka's eyes darted back to his, open wide in horror. "NO! Please Kakashi, I'd feel that I was sleeping with one of my students."

"Well I'm sleeping with one of mine."

That should have earned him at least a blush, it didn't. "Don't tease me, I'm really not up for it right now."

Now Kakashi was really worried. "Well Gai then." He sniffed the air. "He's still sending you flowers?"

Iruka nodded.

"Give him another chance, and stay the night this time. Just close your eyes, his stamina is legendary." Kakashi brushed the dark hair away from the teacher's face and kissed his forehead. "You need it Iruka."

Iruka finished cleaning and bandaging Kakashi's wounds, but without any more kisses, and left him on the bed while he slept on the couch. In the morning the copy nin was gone and there was a note on the kitchen table. Gai 7:00pm stay the night.

Kakashi left Iruka's house and headed for the mission room to turn in his report. His own house was directly on the way. But he had been running and fighting for days and decided that he should keep his muscles stretched by jogging along next to the river. A much longer route and one that took him too far from his home for it to be convenient for him to stop in there. He did however loop back to the academy to make sure that Iruka was there on time. He was relieved to see how much happier the teacher seemed, back in his element with the village children.

After delivering his report he hung out for a while, went to lunch with some friends and later to a bar for snacks and drinks. By early evening he realised that he was never going home again. After walking for many hours he climbed up the Hokage monument and sat on the fourth's head, wondering how different his life would be if Yondaime were still alive.

Iruka had to admit that he really did enjoy Gai's company, especially since he hadn't exchanged more than a few words with anyone over the age of twelve in weeks. The big man's sheer volume of personality forced a little of the old Iruka out of his shell. Konoha's green beast took him to a tiny teahouse at the edge of town, where they were waited on by girls dressed as geishas. The place was old and shabby but the food was exquisite. They chatted and laughed, laughing more and chatting less in proportion to the amount of sake they consumed.

At midnight Gai helped a very relaxed Iruka up to his bachelor apartment. He was confident that he had fed him exactly the right amount of alcohol to make him willing and cooperative, without dulling his senses or coordination too much.

Apart from a few unsatisfactory adolescent fumblings Gai had very little experience in pleasuring another man's body. He did, however, have considerable experience in pleasuring his own. He also had a little orange book that Kakashi had given him weeks before, with certain passages underlined and neat notes in the margin. He had been studying it very carefully for just this occasion.

Iruka _was_ very needy and Gai was inexhaustible. He like Kakashi, had the power and control of the very strong, to be supremely gentle. His big hands had soon covered every inch of Iruka's body, finding all his most sensitive and responsive areas. Iruka was a wonder too, lithe and flexible, with hair that sent tingles through the green beast every time it brushed against him. Gai decided that there was a lot to be said for taking a lover who had been trained by a pervert. He had coaxed six orgasms out of the teacher by the time he decided that he was sufficiently sated to let him rest. Gai had enjoyed ten, not a record for him, but they had all been exceptionally good. Iruka was indeed a treasure.

"Goodnight my sweet Iruka, I love you." He said, brushing his lips against a tan cheek as he settled down next to him.

Iruka's eyes fluttered but didn't open. "Thank you Kakashi, that was soo good, I love you too."

Well maybe he wasn't there yet but Gai knew that with hard work he would make Iruka his. He really didn't care about his rival's challenge any more, now he was aiming for this most rare and valuable prize for it's own sake.

Iruka woke up and reached out to the man lying next to him. Something wasn't right, he was too big and too hairy. He opened his eyes slowly to look at the face next to his. GAI! But it couldn't be, some of the things he'd done last night… only Kakashi knew those things. He pulled the sheet up to his chin and started to look around anxiously for his clothes.

"Ah sweet Iruka, so we awake to the first morning of our love."

"Er Gai-san, I really have to get going. I need to go home and change my clothes, I don't want to be late for school."

Iruka pulled on his clothes and fell out of the door. He got almost two blocks before he threw up the dinner he had eaten the night before.

When he reached his house he knew Kakashi was there before he opened the door. He found him in the bedroom sitting on the bed.

"How was Gai?" He asked as Iruka sat next to him.

"Good, really good. He got me drunk and I thought that he was you. When I woke up this morning and found he wasn't I got sick. How's Sakura?"

Kakashi shook his silver hair. "I don't know, I haven't been home. I just can't do it Iruka. I tried to disobey and run but I couldn't. Then I tried obeying and marrying but I can't do that either."

The pillow on Kakashi's side of the bed was slightly rumpled. Iruka slipped his hand under it and pulled out a short sword. A model of cruel beauty in steel.

"So you thought you'd slit yourself open like your father did and leave me to deal with the mess."

Kakashi shook his head again and took the sword from him. "I wouldn't have done it here, I just came back for this."

A moment of perfect understanding passed between them.

"Alright." Iruka said, standing and walking to a chest in the corner of the room. "But no blood. I've lived with enough nightmares about your blood, I don't want to die with one. I have poison."

He pulled a small envelope from the back of the chest then stepped back to the bed and tipped five blue capsules into the palm of his hand.

"Cyanide."

"But Iruka! When…?"

He shook his head and sat down, "It doesn't matter, I've had them a long time. In case you ever didn't come back."

"Is there enough?"

The teacher nodded. "Should be, one's a lethal dose."

They lay down and snuggled together in the middle of the bed. Iruka put the capsules into his mouth. He bit down hard and his senses were flooded by the scent of almonds.

"Urgh, bitter, shouldn't our last kiss be sweet?"

"It will be, I promise it will be." Kakashi said before pressing their mouths together to claim his share.

It was Sakura who found them first. She knew exactly where to look when she found out that her silver haired husband had been back from his mission for more than a day. They were lying on the bed, in each other's arms. Blue lips still touching.

Gai found her there too, sitting on the bed sobbing. He had picked up something vaguely disturbing in Iruka's chakra trail and followed him home. He'd have forfeited a million challenges to have just this one turn out differently.

"So in the end they just couldn't live without each other."

He held Sakura and let her cry into his broad chest. Eventually she looked up at him, her eyes green wells of sadness.

"I tried to warn Hokage-sama. I told her how unhappy Kakashi-chan was. But she thought the worst they would do was run, that we'd be able to get them back and reach some kind of compromise."

Gai shook his head. "My Rival would never betray his village by going missing. She should have spoken with his friends."

"So what do we do now?" Sakura asked, suddenly feeling much too young.

"We shall have them buried in one grave. Then they will never be apart again."

The End… unless you want to continue?


	5. Chapter 5

A team had been brought in to remove Kakashi and Iruka's bodies. They stood around, looking at Sakura and Gai uncomfortably as they waited for Tsunade to arrive. They didn't have to wait long. She stormed into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her, and screamed at the lifeless forms on the bed.

"Damn you Hatake! Why the hell didn't you talk to me before you went this far? Just standing there half-asleep behind that stupid mask, then accepting whatever orders you were given. How could I have known that you felt this strongly? I never should have come back here. That's why I left Konoha in the first place, stupid ninja codes and people you love dying because of them. And you took Umino-sensei with you. You stupid stupid… "

She raised a hand over Kakashi's ashen face, to either slap him or caress him. It looked as if she hadn't decided which. Then she froze.

"Shut up, all of you, and keep still."

Sakura focussed her finely trained attention on the bodies on the bed. They were starting to get cold, with no heartbeats and no breathing. But there was something else missing too, a slow release of energy that she knew she should be able to detect. The energy every dead creature released in the first hours after death as the cells' chemical factories shut down. They weren't alive but maybe they weren't really dead either. It was distantly familiar.

"Well what are the odds, temporary death. They didn't use enough poison or the stuff they had was old and getting weak."

"I've seen it before." Sakura whispered. "Five years ago in the wave country. There was a boy… Do you think Kakashi-sensei could have…?"

Tsunade shook her head. "It's not a jutsu, it can't be copied. Takes either tremendous skill or phenomenal dumb luck. Don't fool yourself, he intended for them both to die." She glared at the chuunins who had come to collect the bodies. "Well what are you waiting for? Get them into hospital and on some life support."

Although he was the weaker man in every conventional sense, Iruka must have had the stronger constitution, because he revived first. As his mind and body slowly started to function, he was aware of only one thing. There was something he needed, something that should be there and that was not. But he could just feel it, not too far away. He staggered out of bed and homed in on the familiar chakra, then settled in beside it and sank into unconsciousness.

A nurse found him in Kakashi's bed an hour later and had him moved back. When Tsunade came to see him that evening they were getting ready to move him for the third time.

"The hell with it, leave him there." She said. "It's probably just as well to let Hatake see him when he wakes up, if he wakes up. Who knows what he might try otherwise." She looked around at the medical equipment in the room. "Anything can be a weapon in his hands."

It was another twelve hours before Kakashi woke up, and when he did he knew that he was in paradise. It was everything he had hoped for, he was in bed and he could feel Iruka curled against him, breathing softly onto his chest. But he _had_ expected the beds in paradise to be more comfortable.

As his eyes came into focus he saw the heart monitor by the bed and the IV line running into his arm. Dammit they'd survived. Someone must have found them in time and given them an antidote. If only he hadn't given in to Iruka's squeamishness. There was no antidote to what he could do with a blade. Well there was nothing he could do right now. His occasional overuse of his sharigan had made him familiar with this kind of bone-aching weakness. And he had immediately picked up on the ANBU guard, as silent as a ghost, outside the room. A suicide watch. He wound his arms around Iruka protectively, he would just have to wait and play the hand that he was dealt.

Sakura and Gai were allowed to see them the following day. It was a strained reunion. Iruka was able to sit propped up with Kakashi pulled limply onto his lap, his face mostly covered by the sheet. The other two sat in chairs by the bedside, feeling like bystanders to the central drama in their own lives.

"So, one more thing that my father did better than me." The copy nin said. Someone had to say something.

Sakura looked at her husband hiding his face from her. It was as if their whole sham of a marriage had never existed. "Hokage –sama said that you should be able to go home soon. There're really nothing wrong with you now except…" She glanced towards the hallway and the dark figure they all knew was loitering there. "You won't will you?"

"That depends on what she does." It was Iruka who spoke. "We don't want to die, but we can't live…" He glanced down at the blue eye staring up at him, surprisingly softly. "We can't live the way she wants."

He looked over at the Green Beast, who was staring at the floor very hard. "I'm sorry Gai, you're really sweet and I really do like you but…"

"I know, the challenge was just a trick so that I would take care of you."

"You knew that all along?"

"It's not bad to be manipulated as long as you know of the manipulations. A strong man can use it as a powerful tool to become stronger still, to surpass himself."

When they left Iruka noticed that Gai's arm was around Sakura's slender waist. Maybe something good could come from this after all.

Iruka snuggled down next to the man beside him. The bed was narrow and they were forced to lie pressed close together, but neither of them would have it any other way. He kissed his mouth gently, just because it was there and he could. "So where do we go from here Kakashi? Do you think we can go back to the way things were?"

"No one can ever go back Iruka."

"Quite right Hatake. I haven't given up on you yet." Tsunade was standing in the doorway

Kakashi's exposed eye took on a very wary expression. "Do you still want me to have children?"

Tsunade sat in one of the chairs by the bed. "Yes and no. Did you ever hear of cuckoos Hatake?"

"You mean like in the clocks? They're birds aren't they?"

"Yes but we don't get them in our forest, they nest closer to the plains and the mountains. Of course they don't actually nest at all. They don't build nests like other birds, instead they lay their eggs in other bird's nests and the adoptive parent birds feed them and raise them as their own. But they are so big and so demanding that the poor parents can't raise any of their own chicks at the same time. In fact the cuckoo can be many times bigger and stronger than the birds raising it so that by the time it's grown it has completely exhausted them, used them up."

The teacher side of Iruka couldn't resist commenting. "But that doesn't make any sense Hokage-sama. That kind of thing doesn't happen in nature. Natural selection would favour birds that learn to get rid of the cuckoo babies and they would all die out."

"You'd think so. But a full grown cuckoo looks just like a hawk when its flying and hawks are territorial. So having cuckoos in an area stops hawks from moving in just as effectively as another hawk would. That protects all the other little birds. So you see it's to their advantage to have cuckoos, even though the particular birds raising them pay such a high price."

Kakashi narrowed his eye lazily. "So some parents sacrifice themselves to protect the rest of the community. Well that's… er, fascinating, but what does it have to do with me?"

Tsunade snorted. "I've decided that you can have cuckoo children Hatake, since you'd rather die than raise a brood of hawks of your own."

"Hmm, the parents raising them, would they know that they are cuckoos?"

Tsunade flicked back the sheet and looked into both of his eyes. "Not necessarily, although it would only be fair to make it clear that they aren't sparrows, and are likely to be particularly… demanding. The parents would have to be carefully selected, and since they are Konoha people, I expect some of them would guess. Maybe some will even succeed in raising hawks."

She signalled to a dark haired woman standing unnoticed on the far side of the room. Shizune set an orange book and a paper cup down on the table beside the bed.

Tsunade smirked at him. "Whenever you feel up to it Hatake. You can take Umino with you if you like, just don't get carried away and spill it."

The two women left, one the shadow of the other. Kakashi reached for the book and started to flick through it. "Volume three, good choice, I gave mine to Gai. So I'm to be the father of all cuckoos."

Holding the book in one hand he ran a finger down the page to a favourite passage. While under the bed covers he ran his other hand down the torso of his favourite chuunin teacher. "I think we can both live with that."

ooooooooooooooooooooo

So there it is, the final end end. Hope you had fun.-Tampopo.


End file.
